For Hand In Marraige A Castle Given – The Clononey Castle Story and Anne Boleyn

“He saught her hand in marraige long,
But she scorned each advance,
He knew not another wench she would be,
So he made respectable his romance,
When Aragons Catherine was deposed
Who until then wife had been,
Her marraige declared null and void in defiance of the Pope,
Henry made Anne Boleyn Queen.

To her father Thomas Boleyn he gave,
Clononey Castle, before this captured from the Mac Coughlan clan,
So the Boleyn family to Offaly came,
AndÂ their history here began.
Two lie now neath a howthorn tree,
As the tower castle looks down,
And what a tragic fate their was to be,
For the girls cousin who wore the crown!

Slaughtered she was to be, the first of many,
For she could not a son for the king bear,
Jane Seymour came to replace her in the heart,
So the axe fell on her neck so fair.
She used her wiles to gain her way,
Sought a man of character below par,
What she won cost her her life…
Castles for a dowry but follys are!

Clononey Castle – a Mac Coughlan castle given by Henry VIII to Thomas Boleyn in return for Anne Boleyns hand in marraigeThis is Clononey Castle, between Cloghan and Shannonbridge / Shannonharbour in Co. Offaly Ireland, the home of Thomas Boleyn, Anne Boleyns father.

It seems she did not grow up here, it was given to her father in exchange for her hand in marraige, but there are cousins of hers buried there.

A mine of information? Im still learning myself. Its local belief she grew up here but facts say otherwise. A sort of rural version of the urban myth, maybe?